


worth a thousand words

by rronanllynch



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, M/M, Oblivious Ushijima Wakatoshi, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Shiratorizawa, shiratorizawa team bonding, tendou deserves everything, tendou tries to enact a senior prank, ushijima smiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-06-28
Packaged: 2020-05-28 09:16:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19391104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rronanllynch/pseuds/rronanllynch
Summary: satori: *trips and thousands of pictures of ushijima fall out of his coat*satori: o-oh my god i don't know how those-satori: *more pictures fall out of his coat*a br fill for sportsfest '19! the prompt was "why so many"





	worth a thousand words

Satori was gonna nail this whole “third year prank” thing. He’d read about it in a comic book he’d ordered from America. Of course there it was called “senior prank” but whatever. If they can do it in America he can do it here in Miyagi. 

And he had the perfect idea. 

See, the thing was, Satori was generally a weird guy. He knew that. He was weird, not stupid. And part of being a weird guy meant that he had to pick up some weird habits to be on brand. So one of the habits he’d picked up was acquiring countless baby and otherwise embarrassing pictures of his teammates. No one even blinked an eye when he met Reon’s mom and immediately asked her where the baby pictures were kept. 

Somehow even the first years knew about it. Someone must have warned them because a week into practices Goshiki had handed him a stack of baby pictures and elementary school class photos and said “Please don’t ask my mom about them, just take them, please.” 

That was a good day. Goshiki was a weird looking kid. 

So now here he was, two weeks until graduation, sitting on a veritable gold mine of weird and embarrassing pictures of his teammates throughout the years. The plan was simple: plaster the pictures over the locker room, see teammates varying degrees of embarrassment (Goshiki) and anger (Shirabu), cackle maniacally, run away. It was foolproof! 

He decided to start with an easy target, just to ease everyone into the concept and get them used to it. 

Satori perched on the bench in the middle of the room as he waited for the team to file in for morning practice. Ushijima was first, as always, and greeted Satori but didn’t even blink at the dozens of pictures that adorned the room. Typical. 

The man of the hour was next. 

Reon walked in leisurely like always, as if being early was just his natural state of being and, who knows, maybe it was. He was even approaching graduation with his characteristic calm, and not even flinching every morning that Satori yelled the countdown in his face. 

Reon walked to his locker and came face to face with a blown up picture of himself as a baby, getting his diaper changed. Satori was proud of how well the quality held up when blown up to be an entire locker size. 

He blinked. He sighed. He turned to Satori. 

“My mother gave these to you in confidence, Tendou.”

But Satori could tell he wasn’t mad, and there was a hint of a smile playing around the larger man’s lips. Satori grinned widely. 

“She knew I would treat them well. Which I did! Look!” he gestured to a picture of Reon as a baby covered in pureed carrots, and then Reon last week with a mouth full of rice, “It’s art!” 

Reon laughed out loud at that. 

“I do appreciate your commitment to the theme.” 

Reon was cut off by the door slamming open, revealing Shirabu and Semi bickering. Their bickering trailed off into silence as they took in the Ode to Reon, until it was broken by Semi barking out a laugh. Shirabu followed shortly after that, and as the rest of the team arrived the laughter just continued. 

Reon took it all in stride and laughed along with them, but Satori grinned. They all thought they were safe, but they were wrong. 

The pictures continued on for the next few days, always getting the same reactions out of the team. Not everyone was as easy going as Reon, but all of them took it in stride. Satori was glad he wasn’t about to get his ass beat, but at the same time he had to raise the stakes a little, add some tension, add some drama. So next was Semi and Shirabu. 

Their heretofore unmentioned tension had been choking Satori since Shirabu’s first year, so the quickest way to get a reaction was obviously to sprinkle some embarrassing pictures into their hormone stew. Satori cracked his fingers and opened photoshop. This was almost too easy.

The next morning found the usual; pictures of Shirabu as a baby with the same haircut, Semi with long hair in pigtails done by his sisters. But then, amongst the mix, were their faces photoshopped on every romantic movie poster that has come out in the past decade. Twilight? Shirabu and Semi. 10 Things I Hate About You? Shirabu and Semi. Magic Mike? Shirabu and Semi. Satori threw in some photoshopped wedding pictures in there for good luck too. 

Semi chased Satori around the gym for that one and made them both late for practice, but it had been worth it to see Shirabu splutter and turn red. And it had been extra worth it when later, Ushijima chuckled when he opened the storage closet and came face to face with Semi’s face on a Titanic poster. 

The pictures continued for a few more days with the rest of the team, and every day Ushijima looked more and more prepared to come and see his face plastered over the locker room. Satori smiled at that. Obviously, he was saving their illustrious captain for last. Miracle Boy Wakatoshi deserved only the best, and that means that he was the grand finale for Satori’s very successful prank. Satori very pointedly didn’t examine the fluttering in his stomach when he thought about Ushijima’s potential reactions. Maybe he would be mad? Doubtful. Could Satori get a real full belly laugh out of him? Also doubtful. At most Satori was expecting a small smile, but in his wildest dreams he got one of those smiles that crinkled Ushijima’s eyes. Now that would be awesome. For totally normal and platonic reasons. 

The night before Ushijima Day, as Satori had dubbed it, he was faced with a dilemma. Normally, dilemmas didn’t get to Satori and he powered through them with a foolhardiness even the most courageous of heroes could be jealous of. 

The problem was this: Satori had more pictures of Ushijima than anyone else he’d pranked so far. He had a few dozen of Reon, a couple hundred of Semi because best friend privileges, and somewhere in between that for everyone else. But Ushijima? Satori probably had thousands. 

And that was totally, definitely normal.

So Satori hitched his wagon to his horses Confidence and Ignoring His Problems and went to bed. Tomorrow he would put up his thousands of pictures of their captain. And tomorrow, everyone would laugh because contrary to what the rest of the world may believe there are plenty of embarrassing and unflattering pictures of Ushijima where he’s drooling or mid sneeze or walking around with a piece of toilet paper on his shoe. Everything was gonna be fine. Problem solved. 

Satori thumbed the corner of one of his favorites; a selfie he’d forced to Ushijima to take, immediately after Goshiki had spilled a bowl of ramen into Shirabu’s lap. They were both laughing, though it was more obvious on Satori’s face than it was Ushijima’s. Satori shook his head. That one wasn’t funny, there’s no point in putting it up tomorrow. 

Satori went to bed and his dreams were filled with thousands of images of Ushijima overlayed in his mind. 

The solution to his problem fell apart the next day, Confidence unhitched himself from the wagon, and he was left gripping to Ignoring His Problems. 

All because Semi found him outside of the locker room an hour before practice. 

“How’re you gonna do this?” 

Semi was reclined against the wall outside the gym, twirling his set of keys. Satori shrugged and clutched the strap of his backpack tighter. This was fine, Semi was just here to help! 

“The same way I did everyone else's, Semi-Semi!” 

Satori wiggled his eyebrows at him. Semi was, as usual, unimpressed. 

“So are you choosing to ignore how many pictures you have of him? Or have you come to terms with how weird that is?” 

Satori pushed past him into the locker room, ignoring the noise Semi made like he understood which one it was. Semi continued on, undeterred by the change in location. 

“Come on, Tendou, lemme just see how many there are!” 

Satori gripped his backpack tighter, even as Semi grabbed for it. Satori gripped, Semi pulled, and then it was torn open. Thousands of pictures of Ushijima fell out, scattering across the locker room floor. Semi looked at them. Satori looked at them. Semi looked at Satori. Satori opened his mouth.

“Those aren’t mine.” 

That broke the silence that had fallen over the locker room, and suddenly Semi was yelling.

“What?! Why are there so many?? Tendou!” 

Satori ignored Semi to pick one up, apply tape to it, and stick it to the wall. The plan was going through, no matter what. Regardless of what Semi had to say about the significance of the number of pictures. Satori wasn’t even sure Semi could count, therefore his opinion was invalid. Satori smiled to himself. He was so smart, and Semi was so dumb. 

Semi eventually stopped talking and spouting out random numbers that could equal the amount that spilled out of Satori’s backpack. He grabbed a pile and started sticking them up too. 

Before they knew it the rest of the team was there. Ushijima showed up first, obviously, and smiled enough that his eyes crinkled when he looked at the pictures and Satori before getting changed. It was exactly what Satori had dreamed of. 

Everyone else tricked in, laughing at some of them, the freshman taking in the pictures of their serious captain in a diaper or covered in birthday cake. 

Satori pretended he couldn’t hear them asking each other why exactly there were so many pictures, though.

**Author's Note:**

> as always thanks to jenna for beta-ing find her on twitter @ tsukisyama


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